Want to avoid costly landscaping contractors, chemicals, and machinery that compacts your soil? Have no tractor-sized access into your small garden? Do it yourself! You can easily build low-maintenance, ecologically friendly patios and paths. You can edge beds without black plastic. You can smother your lawn.

Use the smothering technique to make a gravel path (and adjacent planting beds) without digging.

Year-by-year account of a small prairie seeded on clay subsoil in Minnesota.

Learn how you can design a satisfying combination of plants for your garden.

Use native grasses in several different ways to replace lawns.

Create your own shaded, mysterious woodland.

You can encourage some plants to propagate themselves naturally.

Reduce your personal energy "footprint" and your garden chores by growing some perennial edibles.

Mulch can be pricey, especially if you are smothering a lawn. Find mulch for less money.

You can build a patio over the top of a lawn.

Feeling ambitious? Try converting an abandoned field into a meadow garden.

In a roundabout way, your plants need exactly the amount of extra water that you give them.

Give your plants a healthy start with Grandma's fool-proof planting technique.

Understanding your garden's microclimates can help you choose the right spot for a plant.

Learn key concepts of permaculture and some ways you can transition to a more sustainable lifestyle.

Poet and writer Lenore Plassman writes of how shared labor feeds her family's hearts and bodies.